Day 9: Pay Attention to What Happens After Your Orgasm
“Use this day to do something daring, extraordinary and unlike yourself. Take a chance and shape a different pattern in your personal cloud of probability!”
― Vera Nazarian
Yesterday we invited you into the gentle but potentially powerful practice of cupping. With no agenda, simply holding ourselves at the base of our bodies — finding presence, gratitude, safety, relaxation, arousal or whatever else happens organically in the moment. It’s not often that our genitals are touched without an agenda, purely to receive or be touched.
Today’s practice builds on that theme of re-programming the often heavily habitual, engrained relationships we have with our arousal. It is likely an accurate statement that most of us have been programmed to see our arousal as a linear event that starts with desire and ends with orgasm (or a peak physical/chemical experience of some kind). And it is often true, for many of us, that it feels like a building that leads to a crescendo that then plummets us into an almost immediate relaxation or ending (that may include a sense of gratitude or disappointment or something completely different, including nothing at all).
But our arousal isn’t innately linear. In fact, with a little curiosity, awareness, and intention, we might even be capable of rather significantly changing our experience solely, by experimenting with the possibility that our arousal has a different shape than a straight line. From there it might seem like a natural thing to wonder...what shape is it? We can explore the possibilities by placing our focus on a different moment within our arousal experience. What if we imagined that our arousal was a spiral, not a rocket ship straight line? The spiral goes in both directions, not just one way. And what if we placed our attention on the moment after the peak experience rather than on getting to the peak experience?
Your invitation for today is to create a sexy situation with yourself or other(s). One that includes an orgasm (or peak physical/emotional experience). As it unfolds, take a moment to envision what is unfolding as a spiraling process rather than a linear one. Don’t get too scientific here; no white board or graph paper required. Simply check out what happens if you imagine that what you’re engaging in is shaped more like a spiral than a linear event. You are not working to get to the end goal of orgasm. You're traveling along a circular path that will wind and weave.
And then, as you find yourself moving into the peak arousal moment, or orgasm, place your attention on the feelings and experiences that happen after that. Rather than imagining that the orgasm signals the end, imagine that it is an invitation into another experience. Or, perhaps even imagine that the orgasm is the doorway to the beginning, perhaps even the beginning. Like a doorway, or a threshold into another land. Perhaps it’s a calm and relaxed place. Perhaps it’s a mysterious place. Perhaps it is a memory of another experience, or a different lifetime. Perhaps it’s just a deep awareness of your embodiment and the places that are still tingling, electric and alive. Perhaps it’s something entirely different from anything we’ve mentioned. The point is, what if you let this moment be the focus, the ‘point’ of your endeavor, rather than the orgasm?
In inviting this practice we are not suggesting that it’s a better, or more erotically well thing to do to de-preference the orgasm or that the post-orgasm experience is the point of our arousal. We’re inviting a shift in what are typically fairly entrenched behaviors and beliefs that end up limiting our availability to the endlessly nourishing experiences available to us. Experiences that bring with them a deeper more resilient sense of our belonging and responsibility. That is, if we are able to see, feel, and engage with them.
For those who might not have easy access to orgasm
or for those who might want an extra practice:
Instead of engaging in a practice that uses orgasm or peak experience, we invite you to bring yourself to a quiet, private and comfortable spot, wherever that is for you. With whatever is your favorite genital-friendly oil, we invite you to practice what we have termed ‘The Waterfall’ stroke on your genitals. This is a very simple stroke that is typically done slowly (often very slowly for maximum benefit), creating a rhythmic stroke from your perineum all the way up to the beginning of your pubic bone, one hand after the other, making sure to have a hand/fingers in contact with your genitals at all times. We are aiming for a slow, almost hypnotic, effect that is – for some people – both arousing and relaxing, which isn’t a common pairing of experiences when it comes to our sexual arousal.
This practice is intended to help us disrupt the patterning we are often taught – that has us only touching our genitals when we are seeking the satisfaction of sexual arousal and orgasm. And also, this disrupts the patterning we are taught that tells us that arousal isn’t relaxing. The Waterfall is a nourishing, embodying practice that gives us the opportunity to tend to our genitals without the expectation that we will ‘get somewhere’ or that there is anywhere to get to. With this shift in perspective we become radically more available to the nourishment that is within and around us at all times.
